The Dead Weight

I’m in the midst of celebrating Christmonth, which is a month long holiday I’ve created between my birthday at the end of November and Christmas. But you can celebrate it too, even if your birthday isn’t at the end of November, just use Thanksgiving as the start of your Christmonth.

Christmonth (pronounced criss-month) is a time when we should all try to live two attitudes to their fullest. The first is “good will towards men,” which is a fairly common sentiment this time of year. The second is “aww, fuck it.” For example, “I really shouldn’t sit here eating a pan of brownies and watching ancient, Tivo’d episodes of Scott Baio is 45…and Single when I told myself I would wallpaper the guest-bathroom today. Aww, fuck it, it’s Christmonth!” In fact, the spirit of Christmonth is all about extending the idea of good will towards men to include yourself too. You get to be hard on yourself and disappointed in yourself the other 11 months out of the year. For this month just relax and do the things you want as long as you’re not hurting anyone else.

I realize a lot of my advice comes down to “Hey, just chill out,” but I think that’s a valid bit of advice in a lot of ways. It might not be useful for everything in your life, but I think the things we obsess about can sometimes be helped by taking a step back rather than being more vigilant.